brilliant actors, brilliant editing

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

I have no doubt that "Protocol" is intended as a silly comedy, with Goldie Hawn playing her usual role as the ditzy blonde. However, this is one of those movies intended as a silly comedy that now looks more serious. After Hawn's loopy waitress saves a Middle Eastern emir from an assassination, she becomes the national sweetheart. Her relatable, charismatic demeanor endears her to almost everyone, and she gets a job in the State Department, despite having barely any idea what the job entails. This reflects the tendency to turn any "likable" person into a celebrity, regardless of qualification or intelligence. Elia Kazan's 1957 movie "A Face in the Crowd" (starring Andy Griffith as an "average Joe" who becomes a demagogue) also looked at this. The mess that we've made of the Middle East only adds to the movie's newfound seriousness.Or maybe that's just my interpretation. On its own, the movie is pretty silly, with lines like "Washington, DC, is the best place to get shot in the ass". Among the more toe-curling aspects of the movie is the casting of pasty white Andre Gregory (of "My Dinner with Andre" fame) as a functionary from the Middle Eastern country.Other than that, the movie's OK. The party in the restaurant looked fun. The rest of the cast includes Chris Sarandon (Prince Humperdinck in "The Princess Bride"), Ed Begley Jr, and Kenneth Mars (the police chief in "Young Frankenstein").As for Hawn's character's speech to congress, it poses one question: can we the people act as guardians of democracy?

Actually, Goldie Hawn is from Washington (Takoma Park, Maryland), but I digress. This is sort of a Mr. Smith goes to Washington type of movie, with some variations but the same premise. I taped this movie off of cable years ago because I had a huge crush on Goldie Hawn. The story is interesting, but it's highly unlikely that some cocktail waitress will get an important job in the government just because she saved some big shot's life. It made me laugh and made me mad at the same time. It made me laugh because some of the situations she found herself in were so ridiculous, I had to laugh. (POSSIBLE SPOILER AHEAD). It made me mad to think that our government would set up an average citizen in the manner she was set up. And the speech she made at the end...beautiful. Too bad not many people have guts like that in real life.

The only good thing about this movie was the shot of Goldie Hawn standing in her little french cut bikini panties and struggling to keep a dozen other depraved women from removing her skimpy little cotton top while she giggled and cooed. Ooooof! Her loins rival those of Nina Hartley. This movie came out when I was fourteen and that shot nearly killed me. I'd forgotten about it all tucked away in the naughty Roladex of my mind until seeing it the other day on TV, where they actually blurred her midsection in that scene, good grief, reminding me what a smokin' hottie of a woman Goldie Hawn was in the '80s. Kurt Russell must have had a fun life.

I like Goldie Hawn and wanted another one of her films, so when I saw Protocol for $5.50 at Walmart I purchased it. Although mildly amusing, the film never really hits it a stride. Some scenes such as a party scene in a bar just goes on for too long and really has no purpose.Then, of course, there is the preachy scene at the end of the film which gives the whole film a bad taste as far as I'm concerned. I don't think this scene added to the movie at all. I don't like stupid comedies trying to teach me a lesson, written by some '60's burn out especially!In the end, although I'm glad to possess another Hawn movie, I'm not sure it was really worth the money I paid for it!